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5 Influencer Marketing trends to look out for in 2019

What will be the most popular channels and where should you put your money? Let’s take a look at what the Influencer Marketing experts have to say about the upcoming year.

Influencer Marketing will be more data focused

“Data” has to be one of the biggest buzzwords of 2018, and with good reason. The importance of understanding what data can do for you and what it’s worth (a lot), will continue to have great focus in 2019. At United Influencers, a big part of our job is to make sure we match the right brands with the right creators. We use data for detecting the right audience, the right channels, to optimize posts and make solid reports which again helps us – and our clients – understand the impact of Influencer Marketing. In 2019our focus will be on creating better systems for optimizing our data and analyzing results. Influencer Marketing campaigns will be even easier to create and measure.

Quality beats quantity – Long term, strategic partnerships is the way to go

Influencer Marketing has been a well known marketing strategy for hundreds of years. Using influential people to promote your brand works. However, up until recent years, it’s been called Celebrity Endorsement. The term “Influencer Marketing” as we know it today has been perceived as something new and trendy, but you can really just call it Celebrity Endorsement 2.0 – A channel most brands have already tested and are interested in learning more about. Many of our clients have been working strategically and long term with Influencers for a couple of years now. To really succeed in Influencer marketing, 2019 should be more about building relations and loyalty, and less about terms like “reach” and number of followers. What really matters is authenticity and how the Influencer affects their audience.

Brands will use more influencers in their own channels

An increasing trend in 2018 is that brands are maximizing their opportunities within influencer marketing. By using influencers in their own marketing efforts and making them “the face of the brand”, they create closer relationships to the influencers audience. In 2019, brands get more creative in making use of influencers throughout their own universe. For example as brand ambassadors present on the webshop, on posters and other advertisement in traditional media. Influencers are also excellent content creators, highly competent for creating both text, images and videos to be used in a variety of channels. Combining all this with posts in the influencers’ channels has proven to be very effective. Take a look at Kathrine Sørland for Lindex in Norway or Sofi Fahrman for Ellos in Sweden for some inspiration.

Instagram Stories for the win

As Snapchat (186 million daily users) is said to be used more as a personal, private platform between friends, Instagram Stories (400 million daily users) is the place to be for influencers. Linking, tracking and mentioning other brands is much easier on Instagram Stories. A report from TechCrunch also claims that influencers see 3-5 times more engagement on Instagram vs. Snapchat.

The benefits of using Instagram Stories for influencer marketing are many. Drive traffic directly to the customer’s websites via direct links, ask questions by using polls and of course; the authentic format gives the Influencer the opportunity to speak directly to their followers, sharing personal thoughts about the brand and holding live streams. Instagram Stories is also one of the easiest marketing channels for tracking traffic, sales, conversions and engagement. You get to know exactly who – and which posts made your sales skyrocket.

In 2019, we believe Instagram Stories will continue its growth and becoming one of the most impactful influencer marketing channels worldwide. We expect a high increase of brands wanting to advertise in this channel and we believe influencers will spend a lot of time optimizing their Stories.

“Everybody” wants to make a Podcast

It’s no secret that podcast has grown to be a big media channel the latest years. Apple reports that there are currently over 500.000 podcasts world wide, numbers growing rapidly. We have seen many influencers launching their own podcasts, with great success. Taking a look at the top charts in for example Norway, you’ll see that many of the country’s most popular podcasts are in fact created by influencers. We expect more influencers to launch their own pod during 2019. This is a perfect opportunity for brands to be present in a channel where they will get the audience’s full attention from start to end – and at the same time benefiting from the strong relationship between influencer and follower.

Other trends we will see more of in 2019:

– Influencers get more personal in their postings, live streams and videos where they talk directly to their followers are increasing every day.

– Influencers keep developing their content creation skills and we will see much more video and audio content in 2019.

– YouTubers will play a big role in influencer marketing, being one of the best converting channels on the market.

How is your influencer strategy for 2019 looking?

We know influencer marketing and are here to help you do all the right things. Get in touch with us today to start planning.